House appropriators approve bill, Senate to act next week

By Jeff Foust on 2013 July 11 at 9:42 am ET

During an hour-long markup session Wednesday, the Commerce, Justice, and Science (CJS) subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee approved a fiscal year 2014 appropriations bill that would give NASA $16.6 billion. Committee members made no changes to the bill during the markup, and spent most of their time talking about various elements of the bill (or praising member Rep. Jo Bonner (R-AL), who is resigning from Congress next month.)

The specific breakdown of spending proposed for NASA in the bill, beyond the general accounts and other provisions in the bill text, awaits the release of the report accompanying the bill. Most of the comments about NASA for the bill were about funding for the Space Launch System (SLS) and Orion programs, as well as for planetary science. “This funding will keep NASA on schedule for upcoming flight milestones of the Orion crew vehicle and Space Launch System,” Rep. Frank Wolf (R-VA), chairman of the CJS subcommittee, said in his opening statement.

Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) thanked Wolf and ranking member Rep. Chaka Fattah (D-PA) for their support for NASA’s planetary science program, and read a relevant section of the as-yet-unreleased report. “NASA has once again proposed damaging and disproportionate reductions in the planetary science budget without any substantive justification,” Schiff said, reading from the report. “The committee’s recommendation seeks to address these shortcomings while also achieving programmatic balance among projects, destinations, and sizes.” Neither Schiff nor Wolf said what level of funding for planetary science the bill contained, but those comments suggested it was closer to the $1.5 billion in the separate authorization bill than the administration’s requested $1.22 billion.

Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-AL) spoke favorably about the SLS funding in the bill. “I think the real concern that so many have is that the agency continues to request an insufficient amount of funds” for SLS, he said. “The bottom line is, we can’t afford to fall behind other nations in this launch capability.”

The subcommittee also noted the bill’s support for NOAA’s weather satellite efforts, which would provide full funding for the Joint Polar Satellite System ($824 million) and the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite ($955 million) programs. Both Wolf and Rep. Hal Rogers (R-KY), chairman of the full appropriations committee, identified those programs as priorities to be fully funded.

The bill now goes to the full House Appropriations Committee; although no markup has yet been announced, it may be considered as early as next week. Meanwhile, the Senate is set to markup its own version of the bill: the CJS subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee (chaired by Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), who is also chair of the full committee) has a markup session scheduled for Tuesday at 16th.

If Turkmenistan launched an armadillo into orbit, you can bet that we’d be driving hard to do it ourselves, so that we would not fall behind them in launch capability. American exceptionalism knows no bounds!

LOL NASA and the GOP pork machine spend more money on launch vehicle development with SLS then several of the other worlds space agencies combined and get nothing for it…but they have people like you and Whittington as useful dupes…. Robert

Sadly by funding SLS for two flights in ten years and so little else, this bill does set the US program behind China, and even SpaceX among others. Of course if NASA were properly funded for the big picture, $22B, we’d have nothing to fear from China, Russia, India or North Korea for that matter.

Even sadder still and foreboding for the future we have tax cuts for rich folks competing with NASA in a GOP controlled House.

If you’re serious with this statement then all I can do is laugh. SLS will fix ‘nothing’ for U.S. launch capability. It’ll be lucky if it even gets to an Ares1X sub-orbital flight.
Of course, if you can demonstrate how it will ‘fix that’ I’m willing to listen.

With SLS two flights, one in 2017, one in 2023 or so, all those other launch capabilities Rep Rep. Aderholt is comfortable surrendering to other countries for the next 10 years are going to be _______________________ ????

@DCSCA…..;That’s a good one: Project Muddlethrough! Yes, folks, that just about sums up, the Low Earth Orbit President’s space policy for the rest of his second term! Muddle on, hope for the best; slow down & stall the Orion vehicle—-tell everyone how we just don’t need it because the ‘commercial launch providers’ have got the task nailed down; do basically the same thing to the plan for Heavy-Lift; blow a heavy windfall of federal money on the hobby rocketeers & their tourism-in-LEO manifest; meanwhile NOT-a-single-manned-flight gets launched, come January of 2017. Yup, my cronies! THIS is what constitutes the game plan in space policy, for the remaining presidential-term time span!

It is kind of interesting. The U.S. has no capability for launching human beings into space right now, but the U.S. continues to have the solid reputation of having the most advanced space exploration program. That’s saying something right there. In the spirit of American exceptionalism, the game plan for space policy is to have the most advanced space exploration program. Looks like we’re doing OK. The metric for the most advanced space exploration program seems not to critically involve how many arms, legs and torsos one can loft.

I should point out that the commercial folks are hardly reliant on a “tourism-in-LEO” manifest. In fact, they don’t have any such manifest. At least Space-X is getting well paid by NASA (and very soon by other nations) for services rendered. NASA human space flight folks, on the other hand, are reliant on a “we’ll-do-something-good-when-we-figure-it-out” manifest. Not pretty. What NASA human spaceflight has sold to the U.S. taxpayer is by some measures just a bill of goods. Back to the Moon! Onward to an asteroid! Apollo on steroids!

Space Tourism in mere LEO, IS exactly what is driving most of Commercial Crew’s nonsense, all this time! If they can just get more billionaires to hitch junkets on board the ISS, then they’ve just about got it made, eh?! THAT manifest would inevitably lead to some kind of commercially-built space station, or at least some sort of module attachment to the ISS. Buddy, then they’ll expand to the point of having an actual hotel in LEO! But the downside to all that, is that THEN the American space program will once again be so wedded to Low Earth Orbit, that we then continue flailing along, with only the going-around-in-circles stuff; without ANY real commitment to departing to deep space ever. Commercial Crew will herald in a new LEO-only stagnation era. Just like when the Space Shuttle first flew & the ISS first-got-built; only worse, and much more harder to walk away from!

The ISS is already obsolete, and certainly not appropriate for space tourism. There will be private stations much sooner than you think, far simpler and easier to construct, operate and dispose of as well.

To be blunt the moon isn’t practical at this point in time and won’t ever be if we don’t get some private money into the game. NASA can only afford so much and SLS so far has 4 year gaps between launches. You cannot support any expansion into space with that kind of launch rate. The Apollo program in its end days had only 1 mission in 1970 and 2 per year till 1972. A pathetic launch rate that is unable to do anything because just getting the guys to the lunar surface cost too much. Imagine how expensive an automobile would be if you needed an entire factory to produce just 4 cars a year and each car was only good for 1 trip before being completely useless that is fundamental problem of space flight.

If you can lower the cost to LEO then the cost to go further out also lowers. Anyway here is how it could happen the billionaires want to go further out any pay to do so and such a mission could be staged from LEO perhaps using modified commercial crew spacecraft. A station is placed at l1/l2 allowing longer term stays further from the earth and again the billionaires can afford it because the cost to LEO has lowered. The billionaires want to land on the moon and that further out station would be perfect for it and again they could support this development.

Anyway from LEO many options open such as using electric propulsion to send cargo and supplies further out. Aero braking is another option that opens up. If you Aero brake you can reuse the spacecraft from LEO saving the cost of launching the whole thing again. Sharing the ride such that millionaires who can’t afford to go further out can afford to ride with billionaires lowering the cost of going into space for both or the Government likewise using this to cut costs (imagine how expensive it would be if you needed the Air force to Fly all personal from the US to their bases and didn’t use commercial airlines as much as possible).

I can’t figure out why SpaceX needs 39. If they get it they are gonna be responsible for all the upkeep on it starting in November. They don’t need most of that crap that’s there. They’re gonna have to pay to tear it down and move it and then build up whatever they do need. I can’t figure it out. I don’t see why they need it. Not and the Texas site also.

Keep in mind that Elon Musk’s long-term goal is to build vehicles capable of taking customers to Mars. In the interim, his customers might be looking at various lunar and cislunar destinations. We also know that Golden Spike, at least in their online models, plan on using Falcon Heavy to launch their lunar landers and crew vehicles. And then there’s Bigelow, who wants his inflatable habitats on the lunar surface.

Although SpaceX is looking at the possibility of building a second pad at LC-40 for Falcon Heavy, I think it makes more sense to go with something bigger and independent like LC-39A. Yes, they’d have to spend a lot of money to renovate, and they’d have to use other legacy NASA equipment like the crawler, MLP and VAB High Bay 1. But they could also market their product as, “Launch from the same pad that sent astronauts to the Moon!”

And as josh notes, we’re going to see SLS and Falcon Heavy side-by-side, the ultimate symbolism of government versus commercial programs. SLS will still be in the starting gate while Falcon Heavy flies.

Elon may be gambling that this symbolism will finally convince Congress to give up on the SLS porkery. The spartan SLS launch schedule doesn’t allow for failure. What if the Orion test in September 2014 winds up with the capsule at the bottom of the ocean? What if the SLS test in December 2017 blows up? No margin for error, simply because Congress won’t fund it.

So I think Elon wants to be in place with a ready-to-go solution for the inevitable day when SLS goes the way of the dodo and Constellation. Extinction.

-LC-39A would be for Falcon Heavy. Those won’t fly out of Brownsville.

Then I have misunderstood things. I thought Elon mentioned the possibility of launching a large core out of the possible Texas site. I know there was discussion around the net about how the Texas site would be good for that since SpaceX could bring in by barge larger non-roadable equipment.

That’s not my understanding, and I’ve run quite a few sims with quite a few possible variants of the Heavy and MCT. Brownsville would be F9H because it allows for the return of the boosters and then the downrange recovery of the core for equatorial orbit, and 39A would allow for recovery of the crossfed multiple boosters and the large core would continue on to LEO, which works both for LEO and Mars and provides much better noise and acoustic control of the big launcher. Physics and geography are the driving factors with these decisions.

“That’s not my understanding, and I’ve run quite a few sims with quite a few possible variants of the Heavy and MCT.”

As Inigo Montoya would say, “You keep using that word [MCT]. I do not think it means what you think it means.”

The MCT has been called the Mars Colonial Transport by Musk, but beyond that it’s unknown if it’s a space-only transport or an Earth-to-space launcher.

And in any case, since no specs have been officially released by SpaceX about any launchers beyond the Falcon 9R and the Falcon Heavy, trying to estimate an unknown launchers abilities with any confidence would be fruitless – there are too many possibilities.

trying to estimate an unknown launchers abilities with any confidence would be fruitless – there are too many possibilities.

Not really, there is the F9R and FH and a 650Klbf methane engine, and fundamental physics and GEOMETRY and GEOGRAPHY, as I just mentioned. Geometry and geography makes things a lot easier and greatly restricts the usable phase space here. Since apparently you haven’t bothered to think or simulate any of these variables through, you can think whatever you want. I always try to be ahead of the curve using empirical evidence. Of course, I’d be happy to look at any of your results, Ron, but hand waving doesn’t cut it, at least for it it doesn’t and neither does outright denial that is not based on any empirical evidence at all.

“Since apparently you haven’t bothered to think or simulate any of these variables through, you can think whatever you want. I always try to be ahead of the curve using empirical evidence.”

Launch corridors, no. Though what you’re doing is more like trying to figure out which animal shapes will appear next in the clouds over head – that you want to try to be ahead of the curve using empirical evidence…

You say you run lots of simulations, but I have yet to see any evidence of any. That’s especially true since not that long ago you were advocating that it was a good idea for Congress to dump MORE money into the SLS to make it an SSTO… your simulations became suspect after that.

That’s especially true since not that long ago you were advocating that it was a good idea for Congress to dump MORE money into the SLS to make it an SSTO… your simulations became suspect after that.

Whatever, it beats whatever it is they think they are doing with the SLS. There are only two real destinations in the manned realm, high inclination and equatorial. There are really only two ways to do this simply, inline staging and booster assisted with cross feed. That alone simplifies everything.

Booster assisted with cross feed means … ta da, the core stage is going to space. If you can’t see that, I can’t help you. Thus, Brownsville and the cape and/or KSC, until they can get people to allow land overflights and landings, and international destinations, which won’t be very long now by the looks of it. But if you want to stay in the 20th century with this thing, that’s ok too.

“But if you want to stay in the 20th century with this thing, that’s ok too.”

You may be good at simulations, but you’re not good at understanding higher level financial issues. And you’re not good at understanding what people are really advocating for.

For me, I advocate for those things that lower the cost to access space.

I don’t really care where the rockets launch from, nor whether they use cross-feeding or run on methane. None of that matters if it can’t be done in a cost competitive way.

And since money (and the lack thereof) is the main reason we’re not going beyond LEO, I focus on those things that are related to addressing that situation. And since it’s highly unlikely that NASA will be getting MORE money, then how much we pay to accomplish space-related tasks has to DECREASE.

My position is that if the US government as representative of the will of the US people intends to maintain the facade of a deep space human exploration program in the form of a giant hydrogen powered launch vehicle than all I can do is make the best of it. The real fun begins when you start to think about all cryolox vehicles when the crossfeeding can be biased to go extremely far (long) down range as you want to go, including all the way to the moon, but certainly anywhere in the world, where than horizontal landing then becomes a possibility. I posit innovation in large multipurpose launch vehicles in the 21st century will not magically stop anytime soon, now that there are multiple private entities involved. Interesting times.

If anyone is interested, a second bid for the big pads confirms my hypothesis vis a vis crossfeeding to the core stage for orbital capability for the core, and early staging back to the launch site. This presents a conundrum with Ms. Mikulski has deftly avoided with her press release. This is as nuanced as it gets in the space cadet world, although much of it is sophisticated reasoning of the principles here. It’s going to be great fun watching this play out on a very flat playing field.

“…I think it makes more sense to go with something bigger and independent like LC-39A. Yes, they’d have to spend a lot of money to renovate, and they’d have to use other legacy NASA equipment like the crawler, MLP and VAB High Bay 1.”

SpaceX might use LC-39A, but they will never use the VAB or the crawler. Their launch system for Falcon Heavy is pretty much like the one used for Delta IV Heavy, which is assembled horizontally, erected vertically on the launch pad, integrated with its satellite payload, fueled and launched. The VAB and the crawler only add time and money to that process, not value.

“Elon may be gambling that this symbolism will finally convince Congress to give up on the SLS porkery.”

If that does happen (i.e. Congress realizes the errors of it’s ways), it will happen regardless where Falcon Heavy launches from.

“So I think Elon wants to be in place with a ready-to-go solution for the inevitable day when SLS goes the way of the dodo and Constellation. Extinction.”

And the best way to do that is to be successful in winning orders and flying commercial payloads, which he is already doing.

As you point out, the SLS has to be perfect in order to survive – SpaceX only has to do what they are already doing (i.e. launch commercial payloads), which does allow for the occasional failure (not that it’s an example of good business practice, but the Proton failure rate is 7%). But since SpaceX and the Falcon 9R/Heavy will mature much quicker than the SLS, the SLS will never be able to show it’s more reliable than any commercial launchers.

“i think they want to use pad 39 for their rumored hlv (falcon x/xx). for that also the vab might be useful since this new rocket will probably be vertically integrated.”

I have no inside knowledge regarding this topic, but I would be surprised if SpaceX were to announce anything more than official work on the engines for a larger launcher. Even if they work on a new methane engine, that could be used just for an upper stage initially.

There are two reasons why I think this:

1. SpaceX has been building rockets that have a market use so far, and though the Falcon Heavy has had limited sales, it shares the same cores as the Falcon 9R. Since there is no known need for larger diameter payloads, or payloads larger than 53mt to LEO, I’m not sure SpaceX is able to afford to build a Falcon X or XX yet without a good idea of who would buy one (or really, lots of them). NASA certainly is not a potential customer at this point.

2. A larger launcher is not the pacing transportation technology keeping us from getting to Mars. A lot can still be done with a Falcon Heavy’s capabilities and fuel depots, plus other core technologies that enable long distance travel.